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Bed tax grant for faith-based event revived
YOUNGSTOWN
The resolution authorizing use of $2,500 in Mahoning County hotel bed-tax revenue to promote a women’s Christian conference this fall at the Covelli Centre will return to the county commissioners’ agenda for this week’s meeting, said Carol Rimedio-Righetti, chairwoman of the commissioners.
That resolution is returning to their 9 a.m. Thursday meeting agenda at the Mahoning County Extension Office in Canfield, after having been stricken at the last minute from their Aug. 18 agenda.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio is crying foul, however.
“We think it puts them on constitutional thin ice. There’s no question that what the Bill of Rights requires from governments is neutrality” regarding religion, said Gary Daniels, a Youngstown native, chief lobbyist and spokesman for the ACLU of Ohio.
“Government can’t inhibit religion, and government can’t advance religion,” Daniels said from the organization’s Columbus office.
On Aug. 18, Rimedio-Righetti said Linda Macala, county convention and visitors’ bureau director, who had placed the proposed grant on the agenda, removed it to allow time for legal research on the matter by Gina Bricker, an assistant county prosecutor.
When a reporter presented the issue to Bricker on Aug. 17 as a question of church-state separation, Bricker’s initial response was “very interesting,” and she said she’d have to research the permissibility of using the bed-tax dollars to promote the Nov. 4 and 5 “Living Proof Live” conference sponsored by Lifeway Christian Resources.
The gathering will feature Beth Moore, a nationally known public speaker and author. Lifeway is a Nashville, Tenn.-based nonprofit organization, whose parent organization is the Southern Baptist Convention.
Rimedio-Righetti, however, said the gathering pertains not only to religion, but also to women’s rights and issues concerning children, marriage, relationships, single parenting and personal finance.
The event will generate heavy use of local hotels and restaurants, Rimedio-Righetti said.
“I’m OK with it,” she said of the promotional grant for the faith-based Covelli program.
“Anything that will promote tourism to Mahoning County I think is a plus for us,” she added.
“We use bed-tax dollars to sponsor events that we think will entice and bring people into the community on a positive basis,” whether the event is faith-based, sports-based or technology-based, said Commissioner David Ditzler.
“We do things to entice opportunities for our community, to show off our community, and I don’t have a problem if it’s religious-oriented,” Ditzler added.
Rimedio-Righetti released a draft of the resolution for Thursday’s agenda, which says the grant will be used for “advertising, educating and informing individuals about this event,” and that such tourism promotion grants are authorized by state law.
The draft resolution says the two-day, faith-based gathering is expected to draw more than 5,000 participants. The county’s CVB board had unanimously approved the grant.
“Anything under state law that allows them to do this in a broad, general sense doesn’t mean that they can allocate money for everything under the sun,” the ACLU’s Daniels said.
State law “doesn’t override the restrictions found in the First Amendment that require government to remain neutral” as to religion, he explained.
“What you have here is you have government – the county – designating money for what is clearly a religious event,” Daniels said.
Almost every church is nonprofit, so under the legal interpretation found in the resolution, the commissioners could give money directly to any church, temple or mosque, he said.
“If the commissioners don’t change direction, and there are people in Mahoning County who are concerned about government funding for explicitly religious purposes, they can contact the ACLU of Ohio,” Daniels said.